Monday, November 30, 2015

Hey everyone! Happy Monday! Hope you all had a fantastic holiday weekend. I spent mine working for my mom, my last time working for her ever. She is retiring this year so it was a special weekend. She had her most successful day in business on Black Friday. End result, I worked hard and now I'm fighting off a cold.

BUT, today I have two awesome polishes to share with you from Great Lakes Lacquers, and there is some fun things going on in her shop today, so stay tuned!

*Press Samples*

Today I'm sharing with you the two December Limited Editions from Great Lakes Lacquers. As an homage to Mariah's Star Wars-loving family, these are all Stars Wars themed and will be available at the Great Lakes Lacquers shop tomorrow at 2 p.m. CT along with some special small batch pours that look lovely as well!!!

Let's get to the swatches shall we?!

First up we have Droid 1. Droid 1 is a beautiful gold glitter topper with three sizes of gold holographic glitter pieces. Perfect time of year for this polish, would be perfect to add bling to any holiday manicure! I have shown here one coat over Thanksgiving Bay, one of the November Great Lakes Lacquer LE, still available today! I think it makes a great pair with Droid 1! Application on this was great, super easy to get good coverage for this glitter topper, the glitter was easily dispersed on the nail.

The second polish in this pairing is Droid 2. This polish is super interesting, it has several different glitter shapes of black and white matte glitter as well as two sizes of navy holo hexes with a bit of silver shimmer to boot! Application went pretty well, easy to get all glitter sizes on the brush and on the nail, but if you care about how evenly placed they all are, you might want to do a little dabbing application. I applied one coat over a golden polish, because I thought it would offset the blue and black and white pieces well.

I hope you liked these two December LEs, they will be available in the Great Lakes Lacquer shop as a Duo for $15 through Jan. 1 at 2 p.m. CT. I've got the Great Lakes Lacquer Winter Collection coming next week so stay tuned!

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

I've got just a quick nail art post for you today, featuring my favorite polish from the new Smitten Polish Christmas in Stars Hollow Collection.

*Press Sample*

In case you missed the review of the new Smitten Polish collection, here is a link to Monday's post, I promise you won't want to miss out on the Gilmore Girls fun! The collection is available for preorder on Friday, more details (including info on a sale) on the whole review.

I'm obsessed with fall and I work in the most picturesque downtown in Northern California. The little main street is lined with these amazing Chinese Pistache trees and the leaves are dancing all over the place today.

Credit to my wonderfully photographically inclined coworker Alicia!

Ok on to the nails!

To start off this look I did two thin coats of Smitten Polish Monkey Monkey Underpants and then I broke out another of my favorite Smittens - The First Lobster. I thought the shimmer in Monkey Monkey Underpants would pair so well with the the deep red orange of The First Lobster and I was right.

I stamped the nails using various parts of my MoYou London Mother Nature 07 plate, which is currently out of stock, but it's an amazing plate! I just love that The First Lobster was able to stamp and it actually paired so well with Monkey Monkey Underpants!

Monday, November 23, 2015

Today my post is a little late because I just got too stinking excited to show you guys these polishes because yes, they are inspired by THAT Stars Hollow! Yay for a Gilmore Girls inspired collection!!!

*Press Samples*

I am a huuuuuuuuuuge Gilmore Girls fan! My best friend and I have spent many a day in our pajamas just watching marathons of this show. Brings up so many memories of a time when I was younger and more carefree than I am today!

So not only am I excited about the inspiration of this collection, I'm so excited because it's by Smitten Polish – one of my favorite brands. Ever since I saw the sneak peeks of this collection I've been itching to shout it from the rooftops: Gilmore Girls collection from Smitten Polish!!!!!

Ok, clearly you can tell I'm excited. Stay tuned to the end of this post too, for details of when to purchase (hint Friday preorder) and a code for a sale going on too! Now let's get the the amazing beautiful swatches now shall we?!

First up we have Buy Me a Boa and Drive Me to Reno which is a gorgeous cherry red microglitter. The base of this is jelly and squishy but still opaque in two coats with a wonderful formula. I got a violet pull from the holo microglitter, it's hard not to stare at your nails forever when wearing this polish! It is a microglitter, so I suggest a thicker top coat, or two coats of top coat. The title of this polish is inspired by the super hilarious Emily Gilmore, in response to her being compared to a prostitute after having two glasses of wine before lunch!

Next we have Big Head Want Dolly, a beautiful bubble gum holo with matching microglitter. This polish was another wonderful two coater (great formula, like buttah) and it's brightness will make any heart soar on dreary color-less winter days. The name here heralds from Lorelai burning all her childhood photos because of her "unusually" large head. If pink is your schtick, this is a must-have!

Next we have I Smell Snow, a nod to Lorelai's sense of the first snow of each winter! I don't get snow where I live in California, but I do know snow is magical. I grew up going on skiing trips every year and snow was my total la-la land. I would just go down all the bunny slopes and sing to myself and be in my own little world. Trying to catch snowflakes on my tongue, eating snow when I fell down and was too tired to get back up and just listening to the sound of the cold air rush through the tall pine trees. Anyway, back to the polish. This is a lovely light icy-blue holo polish with holo microglitter and what looks like some brighter blue microglitter as well. This one is a tad sheerer than the rest, I have shown two coats here, but some might want three. Same great application though!

This is I Ate the Fuzzy Certs another fabulous name and great polish. This is a lovely white crelly with green holo hexes of various sizes and microglitter to boot. It sparkles and shines and totally reminds me of Certs. I love the reference to this one, when Lorelai and Rory are visiting Harvard and Lorelai finds old Certs in her purse, which she of course eats. Surprise, surprise they tasted like keys. Hahaha. This is a also a lovely two-coater formula and the white crelly base gives it a lovely depth which makes the holo sparkle from various levels!

Now for the polish that completely knocked my socks off!!! This is Monkey Monkey Underpants and it is a lovely taupe-ish nude with the most amazing orange shimmer and sparkle! When I saw this in the bottle, I thought, hmmmm maybe not with my skin tone but it instantly became a favorite of mine. And for this to be a favorite and no holo is a big deal! This was also a wonderful two coater, though the formula was a tad thicker, so be careful how much you load on your brush. This is a nod to the "wild jungle full of gibberish" in Lorelai's head when trying to write a character reference for Luke.

There is a polish in here for every type of person, the pink lover, the holo lover, the glitter lover and the shimmer lover! These are all amazing polishes and their inspirations make them even more lovable to me!

These babies are available for preorder (no worries about not being able to grab what you want) starting at 2 p.m. CT on Friday Nov. 27 (yes Black Friday) for 24 hours at the Smitten Polish webshop. Want to know MORE awesome news? Smitten Polish is having a 20 percent sale on all the other polishes in her shop (excluding this new collection) with the code THANKS2015 during the preorder for the winter collection. That includes her fall collection which I reviewed here.

So which Smitten Polishes are you hoping to pick up this holiday season?! My favorites here are totally Buy Me a Boa and Drive Me to Reno, I Smell Snow and Monkey Monkey Underpants! I've got some nail art to share with you with MMU coming up later this week!!!

Friday, November 20, 2015

Earlier this week my good friend sent me a link to an article of color pairings that would look good together and one of them was grey and chartreuse so I just knew I had to incorporate that into my my look for this prompt. My added challenge for this prompt was half and half, which is what I think is one pattern and a different pattern.

To start I did one coat of Morgan Taylor Sweater Weather (this is probably the first commercial polish I've used in months, I should totally up my indie creme game). I was pleased however that this was a one coater.

Next I took a nail art brush to paint a line of Turn up in the middle of the nail as a guide for the chartreuse half and then painted the whole half with turn up.

Then I added the polka dots using Sweater Weather again to create the second pattern. I do like how this all turned out, I was sad I couldn't wear it longer. I know this isn't exactly seasonally appropriate but I like how it's switched up my normal look a bit!

Don't forget to check out the rest of the ladies in this challenge today!

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

Today I have a fun and quick nail art post to share with you featuring both a blinging holo polish and an super great multichrome polish.

The holo/multichrome pairing is something I truly love. It is often sunny in California so I'm always in the mood for a good holo but I also spend a good portion of my days indoors in the office. So I am always on the hunt for a good mani that looks good indoors and out!

For this look I paired two polishes from the INLP 2015 Fall Collection, which I reviewed (my picks at least) here. I started this look with three thin coats of INLP Maiden Lane, a lovely pale grey-leaning lavender ultra holo.

After the base dried, I added straight nail vinyls to create a simple straight line running through the whole look and painted one coat of ILNP Glory (one of my FAVORITE polishes of this year) in the stripe-created spot.

You'll see these macros just how bling-y this is in direct light and then in soft light.

I really did love these nails, they were soft and understated, but then also super bling-y. Best of both worlds! And I thought the greyish neutral base of Maiden Lane would make Glory really stand out, and it totally did!

That's it for today folks. Sorry this is so quick, but I've got a big incoming pile of to-swatch holiday collections coming up for you! Believe me you won't want to miss out on what's coming up from all my favorite brands! I just love the holidays don't you. Promise to sprinkle nail art at least once a week too! :)

Monday, November 16, 2015

Happy Monday everyone, sorry for the delayed post. I spent the weekend helping my mom sell those ornaments and I've had barely had a moment to myself for a few days. So I thought I'd try to squeeze in a quick post of some recent Ever After Polish purchases I've made.

Ever After Polish is a great indie brand I've been getting to know better this year and some of their recent releases have just had me oooohhhing and ahhhhhing at my nails while wearing them so I thought it was high time to share with you my recent swatches!

First polish I have to share is Ever After Polish Creature of the Night. This is a lovely champagne gold holo polish with matching (possibly slightly darker gold) larger glitter pieces throughout. This polish just called to me, love the golden champagne shimmer. Lovely understated, perfect for a celebratory occasion, just add some bubbly! Formula was great, not too thick or thin, opaque in two coats.

Next we have Falling, the mystery crelly sold in October. Now I don't normally purchase mystery polishes, but this one was spoiled in the Facebook fan group (by the way join us, totally a fun group!), and once I saw it I knew I had to get my hands on it! This polish is an amazing taupe crelly polish filled with pink shimmer, golden and cooler toned flakies and bronze glitter pieces. This polish had depth for days, I found myself getting lost in it while driving too and from work! Even though this polish packed a punch and had a crelly base, it was still opaque in two coats with an easily workable formula.

Finally we have Stuffed, the Thanksgiving mystery polish I just knew I needed to jump on since I loved Falling so much. Boy was I ever pleased when I broke this one out! This is a gorgeous blue-green aqua polish with blue and green multichrome flakie, bronze glittter pieces, aqua shimmer and a hint of scattered holo. I currently am wearing this stunner and I've been staring at it all day. It's my happy for the day since I've been on deadline at work and chained to my desk (shhhhhh I typing this in lieu of taking a lunch break today!). This polish was a tad sheerer than Falling but it was not difficult to apply at all, three coats for opacity.

So my consensus? You should definitely check out this brand. I'm absolutely in love with their bath products too. I have their salt scrub, and it's wonderfully moisturizing and the perfect luxury for my hands after a swatch fest (when I don't have time for a mani bomb). And they also have this wonderful product that is a cross between a cuticle oil and lotion called cuticle crelli. I got a sample in one of my orders and then ordered a full size and it has become a definite staple of my daily cuticle regimen.

Now their online shop does not show a ton of products right now, but the shop will get a full restock, including Falling and Stuffed (I think) along with their bath products on Black Friday, and I'm sure they'll be more awesome goodness in store as well. For the latest information, do join the Facebook fan group. Rachel, who is the head polish maker, is highly responsive online and I think that's just great!

So what do you think? Have you tried out Ever After Polish and have a recommendation for me? I recently just ordered a custom polish from them, my first ever, so I can't wait to see what comes of that! Eeeeek so much excitement in store!